Disclaimer: This article contains spoilers!
In this week’s episode of “A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms,” events ramp up for Dunk and Egg.
The steward of Ashford asks Dunk to participate in a rigged game once he enters the lists to earn extra money for the Lord of Ashford, with a small reward for Dunk as well. Offended yet pensive, Dunk declines. Dunk and Egg then attend the first joust, which he isn’t able to participate in because the first day is reserved for competitors of noble status. At the joust, Targaryen Prince Aerion violently spears his opponent’s horse, leaving the horse dead and his opponent injured, to which the tourney viewers riot.
After leaving the chaotic joust, Dunk agrees to a fortune reading from a passerby fortune teller. She tells Dunk that he will be rich and a king, but then tells Egg that he will die a terrible death, where people will rejoice. This moment passes by very quickly, but Egg seems to be much more startled than a normal orphan boy should be, hinting at a secret that Egg is hiding about his mysterious background.
In the last few minutes of the episode, Egg alerts Dunk about Aerion harming Tanselle, Dunk’s current love interest. Dunk rushes to the scene and punches Aerion repeatedly, and Dunk is immediately seized by guards. In an attempt to avoid the guards from torturing Dunk for harming a prince, Egg reveals his true identity as Prince Maekar’s son and Aerion’s brother. From this, we now know that Egg shaved his hair and ran away to separate himself from the Targaryen royal family and their expectations.
Egg is portrayed hilariously in the book and show, where, in the book, he refuses to eat salt beef, saying, “I’d sooner eat the horse.” Funnily enough, I used this quote in my review of the first episode to critique the show’s lack of book-accurate humor. It’s very amusing to see that my favorite of Egg’s numerous one-liners made its way into the show. Egg is also portrayed to be more serious and mature for his age. For example, Dunk and Egg have a moment when Egg asks Dunk in-depth philosophical questions about honor and destiny, expanding on his childish inquisitiveness that the show introduces us to.
The show is also much more whimsical than I expected. “Game of Thrones” notoriously had evident supernatural visual and plot elements, such as the glorious dragons, shapeshifting men, and seasons that could last decades. However, many of these elements came to be believable and became very integral to the plot of the show. In “A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms,” the supernatural elements manifest in a much more charming, imaginative, and overall lighthearted manner. For example, at the beginning of this week’s episode, Egg speaks with a horse, and the horse nods its head quickly in a humanlike manner in response to a statement Egg makes about horses having autonomy.
Episode 4, “Seven,” releases on February 6, 2026, on HBO Max. It is releasing two days early due to its normal release date coinciding with Super Bowl LX. Check out the next installment of “Foxes Talk Television” reviewing episode four next week.
